FEDERAL WORKERS PROTEST LOOMING PAY CUTS

Government employee union rally outside S.D. Navy base 1 of about 100 held in U.S.

Federal employees rallied outside of San Diego Naval Base on Wednesday to protest an at least 20 percent pay cut scheduled to start late next month.

About 50 people from the American Federation of Government Employees waved signs and shouted their displeasure at the prospect of being furloughed one day a week starting April 25. Furlough notices are expected to start arriving today.

The union represents 15,000 to 20,000 San Diego workers at federal agencies, such as the Defense Department, Border Patrol and Immigrations and Customs Enforcement. Organizers said roughly 100 protests of this kind were held in cities around the nation Wednesday.

Melissa Tovar, 32, is a federal day-care worker at the Navy base child-care center. She makes less than $30,000 a year. To weather a 20 percent pay cut, she said she is searching for a second job.

The furloughs are the result of sweeping federal budget cuts known as sequestration, which were triggered March 1 when Congress failed to pass a deficit reduction plan. Facing a $1.2 trillion decrease in spending over the next decade, federal agencies have decided to cut worker salaries through furloughs.

In San Diego, the Defense Department alone employs about 24,000 civilians.

Border Patrol agents could take a pay cut of up to 40 percent, said Terence Shigg, a longtime San Diego agent who represents National Border Patrol Council Local 1613. In addition to 14 furlough days this year, the agents’ overtime will be cut, he said.

Shigg said that adds up to an at least 20 percent reduction in personnel hours along the border.

Athena Stephenson of Chula Vista is the wife of a Border Patrol agent. She said her family is already living paycheck to paycheck, in part because of health insurance costs for her two young children, one of whom is autistic.

Stephenson is also thinking of taking a part-time job to bridge the financial gap. “We are actually talking about living on ramen” noodles, she said.

At the noontime rally on Main Street in Barrio Logan, workers and union representatives waved signs saying “Don’t Cut the Middle Class” and “Jobs Not Cuts.” One young child held a sign that said “I Value My Dad as a Hero. The Government Doesn’t.”

George McCubbin, a national vice president of the Government Employees union, said that federal employees have had their pay frozen for three years.

He called on Congress to pass a budget that ends the sequestration.

“They have to look at tax increases instead of going after people’s salaries,” McCubbin said. “They need to realize there are other ways to achieve what they want.”